Some Memories from Grandpa Johnson


A couple of months before Grandpa Johnson passed away, I had a chance to sit down with him and ask him questions about his life.  For a couple of hours, I asked questions and then typed as quickly as I could to try and capture his answers.  Anyway, I figured it was about time I got around to sharing his thoughts.

-- Sean Roylance


GROWING UP


  • What is your favorite childhood memory?
    • I really liked to shoot a flipper (bean-shooter) a lot. They called me the “flipper-kid”. I found a lot of pebbles and marbles to shoot and wore out pockets carrying all of the ammo. Telephone lines used to be above ground. They weren’t real tall. They had glass insulators on each pole. I got in trouble splattering the glass insulators. I used to hunt magpies because their was a bounty on magpies and their eggs. I would get 2 cents per magpie and 1 cent per egg by taking them to the courthouse. I got to order a single-shot 22 through Montgomery-ward. I was able to pay for my shells by shooting magpies. It would cost 35 cents per box of shells. Some of the magpie heads would get maggots in them if you kept them too long and they wouldn’t accept them at the courthouse, so we wrapped the heads in grass to keep the maggots out. We would talk their dad into taking us as often as possible to the court house.
  • What were some of your chores?
    • Milk cows by hand. We had about 12 milk cows. My older brothers usually did it, and my mom would do it sometimes. Eventually, I practiced on “old betty” and then could regularly milk cows. I had to herd cows along the side of the rode a lot because they didn’t have a lot of pasture. I had to carry the wood in from the woodpile and put it in the firebox. I had to carry water to keep the reservoir on the stove full of water. My dad had 28 head of horses to do field work. He had to mow the hay with the horses pulling the mower. They had to move along pretty fast so that the mower wouldn’t plug up. The horses had to rest every once in awhile so that they could keep up their speed. They would use a “dump-rake” to follow the mower and rake up the hay. It would rake up the hay and every little while dump it in a pile. My dad bought his first tractor when I was in the first grade. He bought a cat for the dry-farm. We still used horses a lot and gradually phased them out. My dad had 3 families that worked for him to run all of the 28 horses. We would start at 5am in the morning to feed the horses and get them harnessed. My mom would feed the men dinner and they would quit fairly early in the evening to take the horses and feed them, etc. My dad would pay the hired men $2/day and feed them dinner. They would work 10-12 hours per day.
    • The first time I worked for my uncle tromping hay, I made 25 cents for a whole day of work.
    • I used to shock wheat. Binders would wrap a string around a bundle of wheat. It would kick the bundles out onto a carrier and then drop those in rows. Then, they stand the wheat with the heads sticking up to dry. Then pick them up with pitchforks and load them on wagons and take them to a stationary thrashing machine. It would be a coal or wood steam engine that had a big belt that went over to a thrashing machine. A big hopper would break the strings and thrash the wheat. It would blow the straw into a pile and the wheat would come down a spout into sacks. When we got rid of most of the horses, we moved to Sugar City when I was in the 5th grade. We bought a tractor and it replaced the horses and cat. 5 farmers together bought a one wheeled tractor and then a two wheeled tractor and shared it. That worked for awhile until they had to split up. My favorite horse was named “Turk”.
  • Did you have a bicycle?
    • When in the 5th grade, the neighbors had a bike that I learned to ride on. Then, my dad bought one for me and Norm to share when I was in the 7th or 8th grade. I learned how to repair every part of it.
  • What was your baptism day like?
    • Several of us in the primary class were 8 and our teacher was Mrs. Dayton. It was kind of a cold Sunday. I rode the horse up to be baptized. All of us were baptized in the canal behind the head-gate by the same person. It was quite cold on June 3, 1934. My family didn’t come and my mother wasn’t even there. Mrs. Dayton would wrap us in a quilt and help us get dried off and sent us home. I was confirmed on fast Sunday in the church.  My mom was baptized when there was ice floating down the river. 
  • What did your father do for a living? What kind of training did he receive?
    • Farming
    • He was a school teacher. He graduated with the highest honors from Ricks Academy. He taught all subjects.
  • What was your favorite teacher or class in school?
    • I always really enjoyed mathematics.
  • How did you learn how to drive?
    • We had a dodge car that we called “the old green hornet” (maybe after I came home from the service).
    • We had a pickup and a truck. We drove it when we could barely see through the steering wheel. We didn’t travel at all.
    • We walked to St. Anthony (about 5 miles) to see the show “Black Beauty”. We hardly ever went anywhere.
  • Did you participate in sports or music activities or lessons?
    • No, I don’t have any talents. None of the boys in my whole class ever played sports.
    • We played hide and go seek, any aye over, kick the can, stilts, etc with the neighbors.
    • We had rubber guns where the ammo was strips of rubber from old tires. We used a clothespin as the trigger to shoot the rubber. We would hide in the hay, mangers, barn, etc.
    • Albert made a monopoly board and a checkers board with checkers made out of a broom handle.
  • What kind of music did you like?
    • I liked cowboy or guitar music. June Autry, Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, Sons of the Pioneers
  • What is your favorite memory of your mother?
    • My mother graduated with the first class from Ricks Academy.

 


AS AN ADULT


  • What is the most important thing you learned from serving in the war?
    • I found out that God took life and left life according to His will. I found out that I was protected because there were times when I should have died but other ones did instead. I really learned how to pray during the war. The bishop gave me a blessing when he ordained me an elder. It and my patriarchal blessing said something to the effect that I would be protected on the highways and the byways until my work here on the earth is done.
  • How did you and grandma meet?
    • We used to have “matinee’s” in high school (a dance in the daytime) with an orchestra. I met Grandma there and asked her to dance. Grandma later invited me to the junior prom. We started dating from there. The first time Grandma ever saw me was when she saw me walking down the hall holding another girls hand. But, she saw something that made her want to get my attention. At that time, Grandma was going with another guy, and those two ended up getting married. We met when I was a senior in 1944 and Grandma was a sophomore.  We dated some and then I left for the army. I turned 18 in May and was drafted in August. I left on the 25th of August. On the day I was drafted, Grandma drove her dad’s milk truck over to my house. I told her I was drafted and we walked over to a bridge over a canal. I told her I would have to go and gave her a kiss. She about fell over into the canal. That was our first kiss. 
  • How did you become engaged?
    • I went to the service and did boot camp. After I came back from the service, about a week later, I took her to a big siphon that took the canal to the other side of the road. I told her if she didn’t take the engagement ring, then I would push her in. Grandma graduated from HS in May, got engaged in June and we got married in July.
  • What was your wedding day like?
    • We were married at night on June 23rd 1946 in the Idaho Falls temple. Afterwards, we had dinner at a café. Grandma’s brothers were going to chivalry(sp?) us (take the bride and hide her until he did something). So, we ran off together so they couldn’t do it—until after the honeymoon. The car had 2 spare tires, a tent and food (loaded down). We left the dinner quick and took off in the car. We went over to the railroad yard and got between some trains and hid. We waited til midnight until we were pretty sure everyone had gone home. We started for Ashton. Every once in awhile, tires back then would get holes in them. Before we got to Rexburg, we had 4 flat tires and three blowouts. We spent all night fixing flat tires. We used up the two spares.  We then had to roll a tire to a service station and buy another tire. We put it on the car, drove to the service station and bought another tire for a spare. We pulled into Albert and Miriam’s house just as they were eating breakfast after being up all night long fixing tires. The next Day was the 24th of July and we couldn’t get through town in St Anthony because of the celebration. The bridge that crossed the Snake river was blocked off because of the parade. So, we had no choice but to watch the parade and wait. After the parade, we finally got to Ashton. But, we had the motel reserved for the night before so we had to pay for another night in the motel. Then, we were able to go to Canada and didn’t have any more problems until we were just about home. Then, the car overheated because the fan belt broke, but we didn’t lose it. I got some wire from a nearby fence and twisted the fan belt together. It held long enough to make it home. On the other side of the hill going down, the brakes went out. I shifted the car into low gear. It was fishtailing around all the curves all the way down which was a good thing since we were using the whole road to make it down the hill. The engine was screaming the whole way since it was in a low gear going so fast. The problem was that the brake fluid had run away from the hole when tilted down hill. When we reached flat ground, the fluid ran back and the brakes worked again.
  • Where have you worked and what was it like?
    • I leveled and helped develop thousands of acres of farmland. (about 17 years)
    • I worked in the sugar factory
    • I worked in the starch plant
    • I worked in the post office
    • I worked on the railroad
    • I farmed
  • What is the funniest thing each of your kids did?
    • We were over to Pam’s grandparents. She had gotten up on a stool with a metal calendar. She fell off the stool and the calendar cut her nose.
    • Pam would get a little piece of fuzz off of her blanket and call it her “kiddlie”.
    • Pam would sit in the ditch while Grandma shoveled dirt around her to stop a ditch break.
    • We used to have a front-end cultivator on the tractor. It would get the weeds through the cultivator. Pam was riding on the cultivator and would tromp the weed through. She stepped on a weed too long and the tractor tire went right up her leg. She screamed and Grandpa stopped in time. It went all the way up her leg, but didn’t break it.
    • Pam used to dress up the baby kittens in doll clothes.
    • I would call Pam SamPam. Sheila was Squeaky because she couldn’t talk until she was about 4 years old. But, when she started talking, she talked really high pitched and never stopped talking, Brian was Bud Brown, and Brenda was Bren.


CHURCH


  • What Church calling have you enjoyed the most?
    • Another way that I have been really blessed. I have been president of all of the different quorums. I was in the bishopric. We were the first officiators in the Seattle temple. We served 4 missions together (53 months all together). I served two Stake missions. I was the branch President. I was the stake and ward financial clerk. Grandma was the assistant stake clerk.
    • I was ordained a Seventy.
  • Who was your favorite prophet and why?
    • All of them were really good
    • We were in the celestial room of the Seattle Temple with President Kimball when the temple was dedicated. We got to visit with him for a minute while we walked down the hall. I exchanged a letter with President Kimball verifying how the Church leadership is handled when the current President of the Church passes away.
    • President Hinckley—because of all of the temples he built.
    • President Benson—He came over to Europe to help the people that were suffering after the war.
    • We asked George Albert Smith if we could serve a mission just after we were married. He wrote back and told us they were not taking young couples at the time.
  • What is one of your favorite scriptures?
    • D&C 76
  • How did you gain a testimony of the Church?
    • I always liked it. After getting the D2 Caterpillar tractor I was up on the dry farm. I had wanted a pair of leather gloves to drive the cat. Gloves cost quite a bit. Finally, my dad bought me a pair. I left them on the side of the cat to fix some stuff. I drove off and left them there. Later, I noticed they were gone. I said a prayer and walked around the field once. I started around the field again and soon found them.
    • I had really good parents and was taught from when I was little. When I got into the service, I didn’t have any problem talking to my Heavenly Father.